An intriguing tale about a foreign world, written with a minimum of sentimentality and blessedly little heavy breathing.
Historical-romance debut by Wallach (Desert Queen: The Extraordinary Life of Gertrude Bell, 1996, etc.): based on a true case, of the Sultan’s harem in early 19th-century Constantinople.
In 1788, Aimée de Buc de Rivery, 13-year-old Creole daughter of a prominent family in Martinique, was returning from convent school in France when her ship was captured by pirates. She was sold to a slave trader in Tunis who, in turn, sold her to the household of the Ottoman Sultan in Constantinople, where she was initiated into his seraglio. The seraglio was a place of astonishing, disorienting weirdness: The several hundred women there led lives of unfathomable luxury and ease in what was essentially a prison. Forbidden to venture beyond the palace walls, watched day and night by court eunuchs, and denied even the rudiments of education, the women filled their days by bathing, receiving instruction (from the eunuchs) in every imaginable sexual technique, and gossiping. The sultan could not possibly sleep with all of his thousands of wives, so there was a great deal of competition among those who wished to receive his attention. Aimée, understandably slow in picking up the rules of the game, eventually scored a coup when she was summoned to spend the night with the sultan—only to have him die later in the evening. Ordinarily this would have resulted in her banishment, but the new sultan was enraptured by her skill on the violin and made her one of his favorites. Eventually, she bore him a son who succeeded his father in the sultanate and proceeded to institute a number of pro-Western reforms (such as the banning of turbans). Aimée survived it all—the intrigues of the court, the army coups, the bitchiness in the harem—and was allowed the privilege of receiving last rites from a Jesuit on her deathbed.
An intriguing tale about a foreign world, written with a minimum of sentimentality and blessedly little heavy breathing.Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2003
ISBN: 0-385-49046-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2002
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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